dualislogs | they show you how to swim

WHO: All Dualizens, old and new
WHAT: Your regularly scheduled NAPs event for the month
WHERE: Dualis Oasis
WHEN: Nov. 7-10
WARNINGS: Please use these if applicable!

Look at all of these bright, shining new faces! There’s even a few less bright, less shining faces - maybe even a few folks without faces - but hey, this city welcomes all types. Chances are, if you’ve just arrived, you're seeing some pretty crazy things, unless you're used to an eye-blinding amount of neon, robots, weird-ass technology, magic, and an omnipresent police force...and hey, if you are, congrats, you're gonna settle in juuuuust fine. But for the rest of you, the Head knows this has gotta be pretty overwhelming, right?

Well, since your quaint individual processing units are probably having a hard time, why not link up with another one? By which the Head means...

Hello, new citizens of Dualis,
and welcome to your monthly Network Adjacency Protocol~!

NAPs are a monthly community networking event similar to the Earth concept of speed dating! Two citizens (new arrivals and old hands alike) are placed at a table together with a handy cue card of queries to help break the proverbial ice. Ask queries and receive results, or ignore the card and yeet yourself straight into a brand new friendship! But don't be too shy, you've only got ten minutes together, and if you just sit in silence for the whole ten, the Network Admins are likely to come supervise and try to repair the uplink through a mild shock to the ol' central nervous system. You might find yourself saying all sorts of unintended facts about yourself if that happens...probably better to just make friends, right? Who doesn’t like friends?!

The weather outside may be taking a turn toward chilly, but you can still get your swim on during this month’s NAPs, held at the Dualis Oasis, an indoor temperature-controlled aquatic amusement park with giant slides, swimming pools, and lazy winding float rivers. Appropriate swimming gear is required for entry to this part of the park, but there are a number of shops just outside that will gladly sell you swimwear and accessories.

For those of you who wish to avoid a humid environment or just hate fun, a dehumidified lounge and restaurant offer quieter, dryer spaces for chatting and snacking. The actual speed-friending itself is in progress here, but you’re welcome to stick around and continue conversations with your new friends.

So c’mon, what are you waiting for? Just dive right in for fun and friendship - the water’s fine, fine, fine, just like everything else in this fair city. But hey, remember to play safe. No running!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

She takes a nut from the dish and then lets out a laugh. "True enough. Was that the motive in bringing the nuts? Find out who might be an idiot?" She's teasing of course. Nobody would really bring nuts for that sole purpose, at least she's pretty sure of that.

He laughs, deep and resonate, at her question, giving her a shake of his head. "Nah. There are easier ways to see if someone's a moron. Besides, that's a waste of good nuts."

She's relaxed, he notices. Either she's been here a while, she's from around here, or she's used to crazy shit. Either way, she's a good person to know. "Nice hair. How'd you get it green?"

"Gotta be careful not to waste some good nuts," she lets out a light laugh at her own joke. It's highly likely that she thinks she's way more entertaining than she actually is. She popped a nut into her mouth and then shrugged a shoulder.

"Born this way. Usually don't get compliments on it." Usually she just got a lot of shit for it. Odd colored hair or eyes always signified a mutant in her world and nobody liked a mutant.

"Ha! I know, right?" Oh, he liked this one. There was a lot of energy idling under the surface, too, humming, ready to do something but not sure what. Something big, though. Violent. He liked that, and he respected it. It reminded him a lot of himself.

"That's a shame. It looks good on you."

"I know." She smirks and bounces her leg up and down as she looks around at the other people wandering around the Oasis. There didn't seem to be any shortage of people that looked slightly different here and it was the only refreshing part of this place. Everything else seems pretty suspect, but it's nice to openly see weird looking people wandering around without too many side glances.

"Looks a lot better on me than black does." It's not that she hates the black hair. It's just she hates having to hide.

"Being who you are usually looks the best on everybody." He follows her gaze, noting how it settles on one person or another. It takes him a moment to figure out what they have in common, and a gentle smile touches his lips as the pieces fall into place. It was the last comment that cinched it, after all.

"Why did you have to hide it back home?"

"Too bad people don't always like letting people be who they are." There's bitterness there, quite a bit of it. But her expression shifts back to a sardonic little smirk.

"Even a mutation as small as mine is noticeable, and people really don't like mutants where I'm from."

He scoffs at that. "I know, right?" There was a lot of deep-seated bitterness in this one, and he didn't even need his Ben-Hassrath training to see it. She wore it like a badge, or a hairshirt, something to constantly remind her of why the world was a horrible place. Some people needed that, and he couldn't fault her for it.

"Sounds like they don't understand you. That, or mutants can do things other people can't. That really rubs people the wrong way."

She gave a nod at the last bit of what he said in confirmation that he'd hit the nail on the head.

"That one," she says while making a check mark with her finger. "We do a lot of things humans can't. Makes them uneasy. Afraid." There's no way for her to hide the hints of anger that seep into her voice with the word afraid. Fear pushes people to treat people in horrific ways and she's seen it first hand. Still, she tries to push it away with a wry smirk. "Jealousy too. Maybe it's mostly that."

"Maybe, but I doubt it." He shook his head. He'd seen a lot recently of how people treat those who can do things they can't. He's also seen how nasty it gets when those people aren't policed at all. He can tell by the grown on this girl's face, though, she wouldn't take too kindly to talk of control, even a little, so he's going to be keeping that little opinion to himself.

"But this place is better, right? Nobody thinks the hair's weird."

"Pretty much the only thing that's better about it." It's the one positive she can find here. Beyond that it's about the same levels of paranoia fodder that her home is. There's that oppressive feeling that no matter what they're being watched. Or listened to. Or both. It's something she can't quite shake. Besides, her family isn't here. A place without them is bound to be shit.

"What about you? You've gotta have an interesting story."

He rolls his shoulder in a shrug at her question. In the grand scheme of things, his story wasn't any more interesting than anyone else's really, just different. "I can't say this place is any better, either." His boys were back home, after all, and probably lost without him. He certainly was without them. "But hey, there's no hole in the sky crapping out demons so that's better."

She blinks at what he says and pulls back slightly with an arched eyebrow. "Demons and a whole in the sky? Really?" There's a hint of surprise tied to the word really. Not skepticism, just surprise. Anything seems possible in this place, but it's still weird to hear about shit like that. Weird but interesting.

He looks about as pleased with the news as he sounds, and he nods with a shrug. "Yep. All kinds of demons, just falling on your head, and people are still at each others' throats." And he shakes his head. "Priorities, right?"

"Thought it'd be angels falling on your head from above," it's probably not the best attempt at a joke ever, but hey, points for trying? She gives a bitter huff at the question. That's a lesson she's learned the hard way recently. Even people working for the same damn cause end up at each others' throats. She wasn't immune to it either, far from it.

"No matter what's going down people are always going to find time to rip at each other's throats."

they show you how to swim

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